''Dude Descending a Staircase'' is the fourth studio album by English

electronic music Electronic music is a genre of music that employs electronic musical instruments, digital instruments, or circuitry-based music technology in its creation. It includes both music made using electronic and electromechanical means ( electroac ...

group

Apollo 440 Apollo 440 (also known as Apollo Four Forty or @440) are a British electronic music group formed in Liverpool in 1990. The group has written, recorded, and produced five studio albums, collaborated with and produced other artists, remixed as ...

. It was released as a

double album A double album (or double record) is an audio album that spans two units of the primary medium in which it is sold, typically either records or compact disc. A double album is usually, though not always, released as such because the recording i ...

on 22 July 2003 via Stealth Sonic Recordings and

Sony Music UK Sony Music Entertainment (SME), also known as simply Sony Music, is an American multinational music company. Being owned by the parent conglomerate Sony Group Corporation, it is part of the Sony Music Group, which is owned by Sony Entertainment ...

. Recording sessions took place at Apollo Control in

Camden, London The London Borough of Camden () is a London borough in Inner London. Camden Town Hall, on Euston Road, lies north of Charing Cross. The borough was established on 1 April 1965 from the area of the former boroughs of Hampstead, Holborn, and St ...

. Production was handled by Apollo 440 and

Stuart Crichton Stuart Crichton is a music producer/songwriter from Scotland, currently based in Los Angeles, California. Career Starting out in 1989 under the name Solo, Stuart self-released the ''Sample Free EP'' in 1990 which featured the song "Rainbow", us ...

. It features guest appearances from Jay Dunne,

Pete Wylie Peter James Wylie (born 22 March 1958) is an English singer/songwriter and guitarist, best known as the leader of the band variously known as Wah!, Wah! Heat, Shambeko! Say Wah!, JF Wah!, The Mighty Wah! and Wah! The Mongrel. Career Early b ...

, Spoonface,

The Beatnuts The Beatnuts are an American hip hop group and production duo from New York City. Its current members are JuJu and Psycho Les. JuJu (born Jerry Tineo on December 14, 1968) is a Dominican American from Corona and Psycho Les (born Lester Fernande ...

and

Tommy Blaize Tommy Blaize (born 5 March 1963) is a vocalist, composer, pianist, and guitarist. He is best known as a vocalist on BBC One's ''Strictly Come Dancing''. Blaize has been singing professionally since the age of 9. He has worked with some of the wo ...

among others. Its title and cover art reference the painting ''

Nude Descending a Staircase ''Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2'' (French: ''Nu descendant un escalier n° 2'') is a 1912 painting by Marcel Duchamp. The work is widely regarded as a Modernist classic and has become one of the most famous of its time. Before its first pres ...

'' by

Marcel Duchamp Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, , ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. Duchamp is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso ...

. The album's

lead single A lead single (also known as a debut single) is the first single to be released from a studio album by an artist or a band, usually before the album itself is released and also occasionally on the same day of the album's release date. Release s ...

and a title track peaked at number 58 on the

UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...

Critical reception

In his review for ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'',

Adam Sweeting Adam Sweeting is a British rock critic and writer. Sweeting started writing in 1979 for publications such as ''Beat Instrumental'', ''Trouser Press'', Australian magazine ''RAM''Adam Sweeting. "Have Faith and Go to the Pictures". '' RAM Magazine ...

gave the album four out of five starts, writing: "Keen

Liverpool FC Liverpool Football Club is a professional football club based in Liverpool, England. The club competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. Founded in 1892, the club joined the Football League the following year and has p ...

supporters and pioneers of Brit electro, Apollo 440 come bounding back with a vast double CD that nobody could accuse of failing to deliver value for money. Where the band score is in their ability to blur the line between people and machinery: time and again you are left wondering whether that was a drummer or a drum machine, a pianist or merely another sample. The 18 tracks here cover a bit of everything, from speedy

dance-pop Dance-pop is a popular music subgenre that originated in the late 1970s to early 1980s. It is generally uptempo music intended for nightclubs with the intention of being danceable but also suitable for contemporary hit radio. Developing from a ...

with shouting to ripped-to-shreds disco, leavened with intermittent blasts of old-fashioned

hard rock Hard rock or heavy rock is a loosely defined subgenre of rock music typified by aggressive vocals and distorted electric guitars. Hard rock began in the mid-1960s with the garage, psychedelic and blues rock movements. Some of the earliest hard ...

. They seem particularly fond of giant 1970s soul grooves with massed banks of strings, as though they had been loading up on old

Isaac Hayes Isaac Lee Hayes Jr. (August 20, 1942 – August 10, 2008) was an American singer, actor, songwriter, and composer. He was one of the creative forces behind the Southern soul music label Stax Records, where he served both as an in-house songwri ...

and

Temptations The Temptations are an American vocal group from Detroit, Michigan, who released a series of successful singles and albums with Motown Records during the 1960s and 1970s. The group's work with producer Norman Whitfield, beginning with the Top 1 ...

records. They could do a lot worse". On the other hand, ''

Uncut Uncut may refer to: * ''Uncut'' (film), a 1997 Canadian docudrama film by John Greyson about censorship * ''Uncut'' (magazine), a monthly British magazine with a focus on music, which began publishing in May 1997 * '' BET: Uncut'', a Black Enter ...

'' stuff reviewer gave it 1.5 out of 5 writing "Kudos to Apollo 440 for the title and sleeve here, wry references to

which may sail over the heads of some. It's a juicy electric foray into retro-futurist funk, the cheesy, strobe-lit spirit of which is captured on titles like "Disco Sucks" and "Escape To Beyond The Planet Of The Super Apes", featuring guest appearances that include a shouty turn from

. The second disc is more of a laid-back, trippy affair?most enticing of the tracks on offer being "Something's Got To Give". Nice, though a few more moments of splashdown wouldn't go amiss".

Track listing

;Sample credits *Track 1 contains elements from "When The Revolution Comes" written by

Abiodun Oyewole Abiodun Oyewole (born Charles Davis, February 1948), is a poet, teacher and member of the African-American music and spoken-word group The Last Poets, which developed into what is considered to be the first hip hop group. Critic Jason Ankeny ...

*Track 5 contains elements from "People Get Up" written by Ricardo Williams *Track 10 reading from "Praised Be Man, fragment from San Francisco Blues" (1956) courtesy of

Jack Kerouac Jean-Louis Lebris de Kérouac (; March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969), known as Jack Kerouac, was an American novelist and poet who, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, was a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Of French-Canadian a ...

*Track 11 contains elements from "Sweatheart" written by Pete Kessler and Denise Davis

Personnel

Howard Gray Howard Gray (born 15 July 1962) is an English musician, sound engineer, programmer, composer, re-mixer and producer who has worked with Public Image Ltd, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, Kirsty MacColl, the Armoury Show, the Pale Fountains, J ...

– producer *Trevor Gray – producer *Norman "

Noko Noko (born Norman Fisher-Jones, 1 February 1962, in Bootle, Lancashire, England) is an English musician, multi-instrumentalist, composer and producer, has formed and/or played with a number of bands primarily as a guitarist or bassist. In chron ...

" Fisher-Jones – producer *

Paul Kodish Paul Kodish is a professional drummer raised in Willesden, London. Kodish has performed with a variety of different artists, including the hip hop act Whodini in 1986, and the drum and bass group Bad Company. He was also one of two drummers for ...

– drums *Cliff Hewitt – drums *Ewan MacFarlane – vocals (tracks: 3, 4, 14, 18), backing vocals *Ian "

Mary Byker Ian Garfield Hoxley, known by his stage name Mary Byker (a.k.a. Mary Mary) (born 20 December 1963), is an English singer, record producer and DJ known for his work as the lead singer of Gaye Bykers on Acid, Pop Will Eat Itself, Pigface and Apoll ...

" Hoxley – backing vocals *Keith Holden – harmonica *Stan Francisco – saxophone *

– backing vocals, cello, additional keyboards, programming, producer (tracks: 2, 3), additional producer (track 5) *

– vocals (track 8), backing vocals *Andy Caine – backing vocals *Paul "Harry K." Colbourne – backing vocals *Kristine Pratt – whispering vocals *Jerry "JuJu" Tineo – vocals (track 1) *Lester "

Psycho Les The Beatnuts are an American hip hop group and production duo from New York City. Its current members are JuJu and Psycho Les. JuJu (born Jerry Tineo on December 14, 1968) is a Dominican American from Corona and Psycho Les (born Lester Fernande ...

" Fernandez – vocals (track 1) *Jalal "

Lightnin' Rod Jalaluddin Mansur Nuriddin (July 24, 1944 – June 4, 2018) was an American poet and musician. He was one of the founding members of The Last Poets, a group of poets and musicians that evolved in the 1960s out of the Harlem Writers Workshop in ...

" Nuriddin – vocals (tracks: 2, 9) *Jay Dunne – vocals (track 5) *

– vocals (track 6) *

– vocals (track 10) *Lisa "Xan" Lindley-Jones – vocals (track 11) *Elizabeth Gray – vocals (track 12), backing vocals *Elroy " Spoonface" Powell – vocals (track 16) *Chris Conway – recording (track 1) *Ashley Krajewski – recording and mixing assistant *Andrew Nichols – mixing assistant *John Davis – mastering *Tom Sheehan – photography *

Anthony Ausgang Anthony Ausgang (born Anthony Charles Grant Thompson, May 22, 1959) is an artist and writer born in Pointe-à-Pierre, Trinidad and Tobago in 1959 who lives and works in Los Angeles.''Vacation from Reality: The Art of Anthony Ausgang'' () Ausgang ...

– painting *John Birchall – hair stylist

References

External; links

* {{Authority control 2003 albums Apollo 440 albums Albums produced by Stuart Crichton